The present invention relates generally to data processing systems, and more particularly to the use of pre-staging messages at a remote location within computer programs and data processing systems.
Within data processing systems, transferring messages between programs using a message queue environment is very common in computing and business practices. Generally, a program initiates the message transfer by putting a message of instructions in a queue to be transferred to a second program. The second program gets the message from the queue and acts on the message per the first program's instructions.
A common use of a message queue environment is in data replication. In efforts to eliminate or reduce the risk of business interruptions, an increasing number of companies worldwide are implementing remote data-minoring solutions over extended distances, allowing continuous availability, as well as data backup for disaster recovery. One known solution, the Geographically Dispersed Parallel Sysplex® (GDPS) architecture, available from International Business Machines of Armonk, N.Y., is capable of providing zero data loss and industry-leading disaster recovery response times.
Typically, a message is a string of bytes which are meaningful to the applications that use the message. Messages are used to transfer information from one application program to another (or between different parts of the same application). A queue is a data structure used to store messages and is operated by a queue manager. The queue manager is responsible for maintaining the queues and for storing all the messages it receives onto the appropriate queues.